boys lessons
They told him, “Boys don’t cry or feel,”
“Stand tall, be hard, and never kneel.”
So he learned young to wear a mask,
To fake the strength they dared to ask.
He bit his tongue, he clenched his jaw,
Afraid to show a single flaw.
And every tear he held inside
Just made him hollow, made him hide.
They praised him when he...
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Categories:
growing up, anti bullying, bullying, conflict,
Form: Rhyme
Misty Summer Dreams
sultry days, Summer sun
budding breasts, bikini
a pre-teen flower blooms
tan skin, baby oil shine
misty water beading
making sweet rainbow dreams
Some Kind Of Misty poetry contest Sponsored by Nette Onclaud July 5, 2025...
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Categories:
growing up, beach, dream, girl, growing
Form: Free verse
1972
It was the year of coming into my own.
It was the summer I turned fourteen and
I was discovering the meaning of freedom.
I owned a ghettoblaster and together
would take my blanket up the hill
to stretch out in an empty field.
My horizons had expanded and
life seemed full of possibilities.
The future was a vast expanse.
Not knowing made the...
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Categories:
appreciation, freedom, growing up,
Form: Free verse
Growing up is hardI think the hardest things
Are about letting him hurt
When I know the suffering is real.
Letting him choose to do what he can
And can't
And knowing I can't help..
I can't ask for more of him
Because there's nothing left
And he needs encouraging
Especially when I'm worried it's not enough.
It's impossible to balance wants and needs
When I...
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Categories:
growing up, devotion, family, father, growth,
Form: Free verse
The Mirror’s Gentle TruthWhen you stand before the mirror so still..
Do you count the years, against your will?
Trace each line like a fading chart..
And mourn the youth that did depart?
But what if mirrors told the tale..
Not of what's gone, but where you prevail?
Not just the texture, time, or trace..
But every triumph you now embrace.
The silvered reflection that greets...
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Categories:
growing up, age, beauty, celebration, character,
Form: Rhyme
Should I Associate Hope To Only Dead TreeForever is a giant ground,
Where buried roots live in hope.
Though, dead in earth and weak beyond
The realistic of growth scientifically.
Unless been uprooted and cast in fire,
It remains a new seed to sprout new desires.
Studies often wonder how each get to cope--
The threat of call, hope yield basically.
But men are death bound;
For...
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Categories:
growing up, anxiety, art, crazy, emotions,
Form: Rhyme
Questions That Taste Like ChalkChildhood?
You want to know about childhood?
Eleven.
Sleeve rolled high in Tehran's burning heat.
Revolutionary Guard's fist finds my face—
metal barrel
pressed cold against my cheek,
the sharp click of the hammer drawn back,
that sound
that steals sleep for years.
---
Professional chess player, you ask?
Sixteen.
Recess bells ringing through cracked school tiles.
We sketch our battlefield in white chalk...
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Categories:
growing up, political,
Form: Free verse
Smile and nodSmile & nod
Actin like my attention spans top notch
Steady glancin at the clock
Checkin my wrist with no watch
Don't take offense
This probably won't make sense
Sht got me all jittery & tense
I really can't help it
My brain cells are spent
Done way too many drugs
Still do...just because
I keep going & going...
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Categories:
creation, growing up, mental
Form: Free verse
my old poemsI read through my old poems
And my heartbreak is just words
I can’t even remember what I felt for you
Or why i was so desperate to hold on to something that didn’t even exist
I spent years pining
Overanalyzing your every movement
Thinking that maybe next time you’d say something.
You never did, yet i still held on to...
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Categories:
growing up, crush, first love, growing
Form: Free verse
Amore the the real kindIn every heart mending moment
I stand and speak you as mine
A one of a kind redeeming love
No shame in my game
The answer is still the same
Glad I gotcha to change your name
I loved our wedding
Unguided until you told me
There was something I needed to see
The start of our pregnancy defined you
Then what's ah man to...
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Categories:
growing up, beautiful, devotion, encouraging, endurance,
Form: Ballad
Tell MeTell me how to think
Tell me what to do
Tell me if my politics
Should be red or blue
Tell me how to live
What to keep or give
And tell me what I know
If I should stay or go
Tell me what is truth
Tell me what is lie
Tell me how to keep
Big corporate profits high
Tell me how to live
What to...
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Categories:
confusion, emotions, growing up,
Form: Political Verse
Why Not MeWhy not me, i always asks,
In shadows where the silence basks,
When sickness came, I felt the chill,
While soup and love were his to fill.
Mom turned her back, her heart a stone,
As I lay weak, so all alone.
He got the doctor, the gentle care,...
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Categories:
growing up, brother, childhood, confusion, emotions,
Form: Free verse
My StoryMy name's ANGIE, are you listening?
I grew up listening to that group called Rolling Stones
I was told you're wasting your time by dreaming
They never knew how harsh they were with those tones.
Words they thought were normal for dreamers
I didn't see why not, nothing could stop that
Until one I was caught with...
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Categories:
change, dream, growing up,
Form: Narrative
Waiting for the Third Day, A Muse ChronicleMuse - Day 1, 2016
For years I had read
Not realizing what I too, had given…
I had given, just not sure what I received in return.
So, in these, my later years thinking on this...
I approached morning’s-day Muse
Fresh with the Sun.
From all I had become in the Sum of Days
Muse asked gently of me...
“Who are you?”
I...
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Categories:
art, career, growing up,
Form: Free verse
Growing Upno one ever taught him how to be a grown up
all he is now a puppet, controlled by dangerous thoughts
that tells him to run towards hill and jump into the valley
freedom is far beyond his reach
he believe his older version was too strong
he had dreams, wishes and knew how to cling with hope
but now...
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Categories:
growing up, family,
Form: Free verse
Specific Types of Growing Up Poems
Definition | What is Growing Up in Poetry?